This morning I made my way to the Disability Services Centre which sits on the small remaining corner of the Withington Hospital site that is yet to have houses built on it.

The DSC or “limb Centre” as it is known by patients basically services, repairs and fits prosthetic limbs. I had a lower leg prosthesis fitted following a below right knee amputation as a result of a motor bike accident in ’95 and have been visiting every 12-18 months ever since.

When you  go there they steer you to a “fitting room” where you are sat down. The “fitter” probably titled a prosthetic engineer or some such then comes and after exchanging pleasantries asks to see your prosthesis. Inevitably he then takes it away leaving you marooned in a particularly unattractive room with similarly unattractive blokes all doing that thing of avoiding eye contact with crotch areas.

You then wait and wait and wait – in my instance (hence this blog), I waited 3 hours today. As if to add insult to injury, you have no tele, no radio and mobiles phones are banned.

So there you are sat – stranded legless, footless whatever with the only entertainment being a handful of womens magazines exploring the wonders of Perth, how to knit with confidence and 18 month old horoscopes and adverts for incontinence pads and chairs that propel you to a horizontal position at the flick of a switch.

But believe me that was preferable to the 82 year old gentlemen (very nice chap) that was being asked to walk up and down between some parallel bars in underpants, that seemed only marginally younger than he, with a significant hole in an unfortunate location. 

Momentarily my mood was lifted when a chirpy lady popped her round the door and said, “The user group are having a coffee morning with tea, cakes and biscuits – feel free to pop round.” To a man the 3 patients and myself looked at each other and looked down at our absent limbs.

Losing the will to live wasn’t in it, you actually begin to think you’ll never get out of there. Thankfully I did. This time!